Intent

Local government remains one of the most powerful entry points into stable employment, civic participation and long-term community leadership. Yet for many job seekers from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds, councils can feel opaque, inaccessible, or quietly exclusionary.

Our work with Merri-bek Council was driven by a simple question: how do we demystify local government employment, while also helping councils better recognise the strengths CALD candidates bring?

The intent was not just to prepare job seekers to “fit” council systems, but to begin shifting those systems so that cultural difference is understood as an asset rather than a risk.

Activities

Working alongside Merri-bek Council, Shankar ran community forums supporting a cohort of CALD job seekers interested in entering the local government workforce. The program focused on practical understanding; how council roles are structured, how recruitment processes work, and what councils are actually looking for beyond the selection criteria.

We explored how to read position descriptions through a systems lens, how to translate overseas experience into locally legible language, and how to approach interviews with confidence without erasing cultural identity. Importantly, space was created for participants to talk openly about barriers they had encountered — accent bias, lack of networks, uncertainty about “Australian experience”.

Alongside this, conversations were held with council staff about how recruitment processes can unintentionally screen out strong candidates, and how assumptions about “fit” often reflect familiarity rather than capability.

Learnings

One of the strongest learnings from this work was how much untapped capability exists within local communities — and how easily it can be overlooked. Many participants brought deep skills in community engagement, problem-solving and cross-cultural communication, yet struggled to see these as strengths in a council context.

Equally, council staff reflected on how rigid recruitment language and informal norms can unintentionally exclude. Small shifts — clearer job ads, more transparent processes, greater confidence in appointing people who don’t look like “the usual hire” — can make a meaningful difference.

This work reinforced a core insight of Inaivu’s approach: workforce inclusion is not about lowering standards. It is about widening the lens through which talent is recognised, and ensuring councils genuinely reflect the communities they serve.